When a website you linked to disappears, the Internet Archive may still hold a saved copy of the page. Broken Link Fixer Pro can look one up and point your link to it. This guide explains how to turn it on, what is sent, and how to use it.
What You’ll Learn
- What is sent to the Internet Archive and when
- How to turn lookups on
- How to replace one link or many
- What happens when no copy exists
What Is Sent
Web archive lookups are off until you turn them on, because asking for a copy sends the broken address, and only that address, to archive.org. No site name, page, user, or IP address of yours is sent beyond the request itself, and nothing is looked up by a scan. A lookup only happens when you click the button or run the bulk action.
Turning It On
Go to Options, set Web Archive Lookups to Yes, and save.
One Link
On a broken link to another website, click Find archived copy. If the archive holds a copy that loaded successfully, you see Saved copy from its date, a View it link to look at it first, and a Use this copy button. Click Use this copy and every post that uses the link is changed to the archive address, the same change as Edit URL. Archive addresses always use https.
Many Links
Filter to Broken, select the links, and choose Use a web archive copy (broken links to other sites) from the bulk actions. Each link is looked up in turn, and the ones with a copy are changed. The others are skipped and counted.
When There Is No Copy
The row says No saved copy found and offers Search the archive yourself, a link to search by hand, because the archive’s service can sometimes answer empty for a page it does hold. Answers are remembered for a while, a week when a copy was found and a day when none was, so asking again does not ask the archive again. A broken link to a page on your own site is not looked up: use a redirect instead.
This feature is available in Broken Link Fixer Pro.